Raise longbowmans range - ANSWERED

[Savra]

Could we raise the longbowmans of humans range from 2-5 to 2-6? Longbows can shoot at longer range then normal bows so this should be changed.

[makazuwr32]

We have multiple problems here with this change:
1. Balancing: giving them higher range at base will mean that humans will become best ranged race without subs;
2. For their increased range they have ability that allows them once in a while to get +2 range;
3. Humans actually supposed to be worse than elves in terms of range (at least attack range of shooters) so this change will mean that elves also require similar cheap longbowman and increased range for sentry which again will cause balancing problems;
4. 10 maxed range for basic shooter unit that can be trained in tc (and who can get +2 range for next turn) is too high for sure. Definately no without rebalance of whole system of all ranged units' ranges.

[Alexander82]

My suggestion would be to lower normal archer range to 8 maxed and increase a bit its attack.

In that case I would also remove the longbowman aimed shot but slightly increase attack as well.

This way elves will be the race with the cheapest 9 range archer. Humans will have range 8 on their 2 turns archer but better attack and the same elven range but higher attack on their 3 turns archer, orcs will have a 2 turns 7 range archer and a 3 turns 8 range archer, undeads will also have a 7 range archer for 2 turns. Scalefolks can have kobolds with range 7 and lizards with range 8, dwarves at the moment have range 8 and 9 on guns, so they should be fine.

[Savra]

I'm fine with that idea, let's try that then.

[Anchar]

I am against reducing the range of human archers, so they will lose their only advantage over orcs, especially since the elves have druids that give an increase to the range and elves in 6 turns with a range of 10 at the maximum. I'm more in favor of increasing the range of the 3-way archer but removing his skill.

[Savra]

Actually it wouldn't remove from them their advantage over orcs, archers weren't even their advantage to begin with, plus on reducing their range humans archers will get a bonus to attack.

Aside from that, from one of the previous topics Alex brought up a good point that I've been meaning to ask about which I'll open in a new topic that will give humans a different advantage over orcs. It would also effect dwarves too I guess.

Anyways, reducing their range won't be too bad in my opinion, we could always give longbowmen aimed shots after research as well.

[Anchar]

Even if human archers were not planned as an advantage, they are little more than you can fight back the orcs, in my opinion the fact that human archers are better than orc is logical.

Let's be honest that players always prefer to take orc archers, not goblins and strengthen them with shamans + their archers go 2 stages earlier than humans and initially have a greater attack range which gives them the right to kill archers in 2 turns for 1 shot + orc slave gives them 2 action = remote killing machine in 3 turns.

In turn, such an archer needs 3 human ones, on elves he is killed with 5 shots, in total, you will need to spend at least 6 turns to kill one, if you do not finish him, he will be cured by a shaman or he will stay in the building.

The increased range is the only thing that gives you an equal chance of fighting the orcs

I agree to such changes only if the damage of the archer in 3 turns is higher than that of the orc and the archer does not die from one shot, or if he has a double shot from the priest, or if you remove the enhancements from the shaman and the orc slave from the orc archers.

[Savra]

That actually reminds me, @Alexander82 why does the Orc slaver's ability work on ALL units instead of just workers? If I remember correctly they were only supposed to buff workers, not things like giant marksman giving them +1 speed and +1 actions.

The orc strength ability will remain but the whiplash should only effect workers, as for the human archers getting a range reduction in terms of range range buff, it won't end up being higher then orcs because orcs got more strength in their draw, the Orc archer is able to shoot arrows at much higher impact due to this over humans ones. If we have them a aimed shot ability on research that would improve human longbow archers also.

Furthermore, as Alex said in an earlier post, humans will be getting better range upgrades anyway in future, just like elves will so this would make that balance a little easier.

[Anchar]

That's when people get their range improvements, then we can talk about their overall range decrease by 1.I am against such measures.

At all i believe that the range of all goblin and orc archers should be 7 maximum, for an orc this is compensated by his increased life and attack and the fact that all other Orc and Goblin units are stronger than human.

[Savra]

The orcs range is fine the way it is, the Orc archer is the orcs equivalent to a longbowman, hence why the range is higher then the goblins, that's why longbowman should be a similar matter, for dwarves this is a similar concept with the rifleman and the crossbowman

A 3 turn orc archer with a max range of 8 is fine, in the case of the human archer, it's range will end up the same as the Orc archer who has 2-6 range, on top of the fact that if we add aimed shot as a tech and ability for the human archer, that could increase the range, and damage even higher, making it still better then the orcs archer and on par or at least close to the elves 2 turn archer. In the end it ends up better then what it was.

That is to say if human archer isn't getting range reduced to 2-4, if that's the case I'm against that.

[Anchar]

it turns out that a human archer in 2 turns will have a range at 1 stage 2-6, at 2 stages 2-7, at 3 stages 2-8; and the archer in 3 moves at 1 stage 2-7, at 2 stages 2-8, at 3 stages 2-9 + skill at +2 range, because according to the logic similar to the orcs, a human archer in 3 moves should have +1 range relative to the archer in 2 turns. Is that what you want to do?

I believe that against the background of the fact that the orcs are stronger than humans in almost all areas, they do not need such a weakening. This can be done when the orcs are balanced in other categories.

[Savra]

The range increase was what I was originally meaning.

Though I had to re-read Alex's post and realized that that proposal has only 2 outcomes, either human archers (2 turn) get range reduced to 2-4 at max having 2-7 range, while longbowman has range 2-5 with max being 2-8 plus both get damage increase which sets the base archer at the same damage output of more then the goblin archer, with something similar for the longbowman in comparison to the Orc archer.

The other might be that all archer forms have a set range and the blacksmith techs are the ones that upgrade their range, in that regard, human 2 turn archer would have 2-5 range at start and at max upgrade with blacksmith techs, it would have 2-7 range, while longbowman would have 2-6 range at start while having 2-8 range at max, and both will still get a damage boost.

So in the end, the archers end up benefiting more then if we left them the way they were, though I actually prefer that second option.

[Anchar]

why do you write that an archer for 2 moves will have a maximum range of 7 and an archer for 3 moves will have 8? It seemed to me that the range of the archer in 2 turns will make a maximum of 8, which is 1 lower than the existing one, and the archer in 3 turns will simply leave the range as it is.

As far as I understood Alexander's message, he writes that instead of increasing the longbowmen range by +1, he wants to reduce the range of ordinary archers by -1 + remove longbowmen their long-range shooting skills, and compensate for this nerf by adding +1 or +2 to the attack of all archers. Bearing in mind the maximum possible range.

I do not agree with this situation.

[Savra]

Ya, I had to re-read the bottom explanation, at max, 2 turn archers will have 8 range, while the longbowman has max range of 9, basically they end with a longer range then orcs still, with similar, if not better attack.

He says the longbowman will have the same range as elf archer.

[Anchar]

Which is a nerf for a human against the background of overly strong orcs. Compensating the range with an increase of +1 damage is ridiculous considering that the orcs have an enchanter in 3 turns that strengthens their attack and an orc slaver that doubles their actions + vitality of orc archers.

In this combination, Orc players use the following tactics
1) they make orc archers and orc shaman
2) the shaman imposes an effect on enhancements on archers, so that the orcs kill human archers with 1 shot
3) when the orc archer has few lives, the orc shaman heals him.
It will not work to kill an orc archer or an orc shaman at once, since they have a lot of lives + human archers initially have a shorter distance than orc + orc archers go to the next stage before human.
Spear throwers will not be able to kill orc archers either, since those have too small range and the orcs will simply retreat from the kill.

[makazuwr32]

We right now after discussion have next idea for ranges of units depending on races:
Orcs — 7 range for base shooters, 8 for elite ones, 7 range for throwers;
Undeads — 7 range for base shooters, 8 for elite ones, 6-7 range for throwers;
Humans — 8 range for shooters (9 for longbowman and imperial one), 7 range for throwers;
Dwarves — 8 range for shooters (9 for musketeer), 6 for throwers;
Elves — 9 range for shooters (10 for sentry), 6 for throwers, removal of range increasing part from vision spell (it will temporary give only bonus attack only, later will be changed to armor reduce during attack effect (aka it will count enemy armor lower by x amount)), removal completely aura from elven outpost.

[Anchar]

what is meant by elite - rank 3 archers in 2 turns or archers in 3 turns?

[Alexander82]

@makazuwr32

My general opinion is:

1) we keep things as they are

2) we give +1 range and -2 damage to longbowman, remove aimed shot and we should, then, give a 10 range archer for the basic elven army.

3) we reduce range of basic human archer and increase damage by 2. He might also get the aimed shot ability.

In general I do not plan of lowering thraximum range of all other races as those are already outranged by elves and humans at base.

In maps with a lot of obstacles having +1 range is a great advantage and having +2 range becomes a huge advantage.

I prefer to make elves the best archer on the lower end of their army (having the cheapest 9 range units in a game where some races don't get that range without the aid of sub factions).

Elves can already bring their ranged units to range 11 (basic) and 12 (sentry) so they are already the best archers in our game.

For other races is fine to have 9 range subfaction archers as those are generally more costly and can't be trained at tcs (and thus are in much smaller numbers).

[Alexander82]

what is meant by elite - rank 3 archers in 2 turns or archers in 3 turns?

Elites are units from subraces/subfactions

[Anchar]

That is, do you want longbowmen human to have a range of 10 at maximum and for elven archers in 2 turns 10 range at maximum?

[Alexander82]

That is, do you want longbowmen human to have a range of 10 at maximum and for elven archers in 2 turns 10 range at maximum?

no, in that case elves would need 10 range on another unit (maybe the elven captain or a brand new unit)

[Anchar]

My opinion 1) make the max range of the trucker and the imperial archer 10 but remove their skill, I honestly did not know that human truckers have a skill that increases their range by 2 (it was not clear from the hoof icon what it was)
2) Leave ordinary archers as they are
3) Do not change the damage readings to anyone

Elves, on the other hand, have druids who add a shot range to 11, people will not be more than 10, orcs will compensate for their range with their high attack and high survivability

[Alexander82]

Elves, on the other hand, have druids who add a shot range to 11, people will not be more than 10, orcs will compensate for their range with their high attack and high survivability

The fact that elves had to be better archers was the reason why it has that ability instead of an actual range increase.

In any case I'm fine with any of the 3 options I proposed, so if the longbowman will get extra range it will loose at least some extra attack at base (it was given to compensate the lack of range increase) and elves will need a range 10 unit as well.

[Savra]

Reading through @makazuwr32 suggestion, it looks like it should be fine.
Btw if your referring to the aimed shot for the elf sentry to increase its range to 12, it actually reduces their range by 1, deducts speed by 4, deducts attack by 4, and increases actions by 2,

Anyway, @Alexander82 you could just combine your idea with Mak's, giving the elves a longbow unit, while doing what you suggested with the longbow unit for humans.

Orc archer could just be a stronger archer for orcs compared to the goblin archers, while units with higher range could be left to sub races like for example, longbow units for hobgoblins.

Undead could have a 8 ranged unit for the phantoms, the phantom archer that was suggested that is. They have other means of reaching high ranges anyway like the use of the liches and their magic missiles which can reach range 8.

As for the throwers idea, I suggest we leave for the races a max range of 6 for the throwers while the trolls, being bigger and stronger as well as more costly, could have 7 at max.

The elves outpost should remain with their vision aura so that they still have some uses by upping the unit insides attack, but you could remove the range bonus of you feel like.

[Savra]

Actually, max range elves can get is 11 with the sentry alone, aimed shot for the others only grants +9 attack, with -10 speed, only humans aimed shot increases range by 2, attack by 2, and deducts speed by 3.

[Anchar]

I will agree with Macazuwr suggestion if the range of the orc archer equals that of the goblin archer and 1 lower than human archers. I believe that orc archers should be inferior to human archers by 1 in range

As for the trolls, although they are stronger, the shells throw larger and heavier ones, as a result of which the range is the same as that of other throwers, and their cost is paid off by their high power.

[Savra]

I wasn't referring to the crusher, I was referring to the axe thrower and the headhunter who have lighter munitions.

[Anchar]

Then if their ammo is standard and their damage needs to be done exactly the same as that of the orcs? For example, a troll ax thrower can damage an orc ax thrower. As far as I can see from the damage they throw larger spears and axes, and the troll spear thrower throws 3 spears at once, he needs to reduce the action to 1

[Savra]

That ones actually fine because even though they may throw farther and hit harder, and throw more then their counter parts, they also can be easily burned to death too, on top of the fact that being classified as throwers they also suffer from those weaknesses as well, plus they cost more.

If you look at undead, you'll notice their Skirmisher also has more then 1 action. Humans, dwarves, and elves skirmishers have 1 action because they are cheap, and easy to produce, with less weaknesses.

Headhunters aren't as strong as people think they are in that respect. The troll axe thrower is just a anti infantry unit so it's mostly just a archer anyway with different munition.

[Alexander82]

I believe that orc archers should be inferior to human archers by 1 in range

That would mean increasing the range of goblin archer as orcish archer already has -1 range on human archer and that's not going to change (I might raise the goblin archer's range though).